NEW DSNG BOOK 18! [CLICK ON THE BANNER BELOW]

Saturday, October 8, 2011

So the New 52 from DC Comics included a revamp of Supergirl, the alien cousin of Superman from planet Krypton. Kara Zor-El has been reinterpreted so many times over the years that I've lost track of her multiple identities.

But in this latest 2011 version, Supergirl is featured with a peculiar costume designed by pro-artist Jim Lee. Take a close look at these images from the New 52 comic book Supergirl #1:

You can see that she looks rather smooth and sexy; but she still has a peculiar misalignment between her red panties and her blue leotard top, around the belt line near her hips. And I'm not sure why her knees are bare. She may be using Kryptonian Superglue to hold that cape around her neck beneath her chin; there doesn't seem to be any surface button latching it in place. In my opinion, her new outfit looks a bit weird. The image of Kara that I drew above was modified, so that it would look more fluent.

I think Jim Lee, the concept artist behind the redesign, tried a bit too hard to make Supergirl look unique & futuristic.... and now, imagine what this would look like in a movie... DC Comics appears to have a nag for creating stuff that looks great on paper, but often the designs don't translate very well onto the big screen. Take Wonder Woman, for instance: in these modern times, no one wants to go to the movie theaters to see a heroic woman running around with white stars all over her blue thong, with high-heeled red boots.

You can check out this past article that shows the comparisons of the redesigned WonderWoman costume, done by Jim Lee over HERE. And that costume was part of the rejected Wonder Woman TV series pilot...

Don't get me wrong. I respect Jim Lee and consider him a mentor. In fact, I believe that his style is virtually the national standard for American comic art. Back in the 90s, because of his style and his work with Image Comics / Wildstorm Comics, he became a self-made millionaire. And now he has literally sold his major Wildstorm characters to DC Comics, where he works as the senior Co-Publisher. Jim is so popular that on Wikipedia, out of 6 other guys, the search for "Jim Lee" goes straight to his freakin' profile page.

In Supergirl #1, Kara's spaceship pod crash-lands on earth, in a frigid environment where it is snowing. And as soon as the sun comes up in a few hours, she instantly starts absorbing the golden rays - which give her super-strength & heat vision. Anyway, according to the cover image for Supergirl #2 shown on the left, she has a run-in with her cousin [Superman], who she doesn't recognize at all. Hence they have a brawl that lasts for about half the story. Will she eventually interact with other female superheroes / the Legion of Heroes? [a young team, separate from the Teen Titans in the DC Universe]

Apparently we'll have to wait and see... But I hope this book will have a consistent writer & artist team, so that they can build a true coherent legacy for the new Supergirl, thus giving us another classic graphic novel like Michael Turner and Jeph Loeb did.